People's Democracy

(Weekly Organ of the Communist Party of India
(Marxist)

Vol. XXXV

No.
19

May
08,
2011

AIR
INDIA
STRIKE

Management
Responsible for Grievances, Revenue Losses

IN a letter addressed to Vayalar Ravi,
minister for civil aviation, on April 29, CITU vice president M K
Pandhe has pointed
out the various steps taken by the Air India management to favour the
private
sector, reducing in this process the market share of Air India
in a
planned manner. Pandhe also pointed out that both Indian Airlines and
Air India
were
running well prior to their merger but that the merged company has
become sick due
to mismanagement, wasteful expenditure and pro-private sector policies.

In this background, Pandhe has demanded
that the minister must call a meeting of all the trade unions operating
in Air India
in order to
find an agreeable solution to the present impasse.

Pandhe’s letter to the minister of civil aviation
followed his attempts on several occasions to get an appointment with
the
minister. The CITU leader was not given an appointment by that time.

Iterating the point that the avoidable strike of Air India
pilots
has been causing extreme difficulties for the Air India passengers,
Pandhe
added that the strike is likely to bring down the airline’s market
share which
is already declining very fast.

Of late, the public concern about the working of the
Ministry of Civil Aviation and Air India has become quite
pressing and
those who wish a strengthening of the public sector are extremely
worried about
the future of the Air India itself.

The scam in issuing licenses to fake pilots by the
Ministry of Civil Aviation has shocked the entire country. While the
police have
taken action against some pilots and officials, the Ministry of Civil
Aviation
has not taken any strong action, nor even ordered a high level enquiry
into the
matter. In this connection, the CITU leader’s missive pointed out that
the daughter
of an official of the ministry got a pilots license while she had
studied in a
school having no aeroplane or hangar in Raipur.
This state of licensing has caused serious apprehensions among the
airline
passengers about their safety.

The letter also pointed out how the electronic media
have highlighted the issue of lucrative routes of Air India
being
handed over to private sector in a planned manner, causing severe loss
of
revenue to the public sector undertaking. However, no enquiry has been
conducted
to fix up the responsibility for such a serious revenue loss. This has
emboldened
the Air India management to openly favour the private sector airlines
in other
ways also and damaged the interests of the Air India. The Ministry of
Civil
Aviation has not taken any action to protect the interest of the public
sector
carrier.

Another aspect which Pandhe drew attention to is that
the lucrative ground handling job has been handed over to the private
sector,
again causing severe revenue losses to the public sector.

And to top it all, after outsourcing the profit making
routes to the private sector, Air India is now complaining
that it is
burdened with surplus manpower. This is totally unjustified, the CITU
leader
said.

Over three years have passed since the merger of Air India
and
Indian Airlines in August 2007. However, the Air India management has
not even deemed
it necessary to bring uniformity in the pay scales and working
conditions. This,
Pandhe’s letter stressed, is demoralising the employees of the company
who do
not see any future for them. In this connection, the letter has also
quoted an
example. While the Air India pilots are getting fixed 80 hours flying
allowance
per month, even if they are flying less then 80 hours in a month, the
erstwhile
Indian Airlines pilots are paid allowance only for the actual hours of
flying
they have been allotted in a month.

It is surprising that, even after more than three
years of merger of the two companies, the Air India management has not
taken
any steps to introduce uniform working conditions for all the of Air
India
employees.

Further, due to the Air India’s withdrawal from the
lucrative
routes, its management has drastically reduced the flying hours of the
pilots
who are now underutilised.

Another extremely sad thing in this regard is that the
Air India management have not implemented even the recommendations of
Parliamentary Standing Committee on Transport and of the Committee on
Public
Undertakings. This utter disregard for parliamentary committees is a
matter of
serious concern for the trade union movement in India.

The CITU leader also pointed out that it is just due
to the obduracy of the Air India management that the talks with the
striking
pilots before the Chief Labour Commissioner (Central) have not come to
any
fruitful conclusion. This has resulted in the failure of conciliation.
The
Chief Labour Commissioner (Central) has clearly put the entire blame on
the Air
India management for the failure of the talks.

Yet another aspect the CITU leader’s missive has
pointed out is that there has been no wage revision in Air India
since
1997. However, its employees have been working with devotion, in the
hope that the
management would address their genuine grievances when the company
improves its
financial position. But the employees are extremely perturbed as the
steps
being taken by the chairman are only making the company still sicker.

It is a matter of serious concern that 40 employees
who are members of Air Corporations Employees Union and 2 employees of
All
India Engineers Association are still facing termination of services
for nearly
one year. Though the unions have expressed deep regret for the
unfortunate
agitation and the Ministry of Civil Aviation has agreed to take the
employees
back on duties, the assurance is yet to be implemented. The Air India
management is imposing humiliating conditions on these employees for
taking
them back on duty.

It is a matter worth referring to the CBI for
investigation
as to how the Indian Airlines and Air India, which were working
well earlier,
have become sick after the merger of the two companies. There are
several
examples of wasteful expenditure, nepotism and corruption as well as of
clandestine
attempts to favour the private sector at the cost of Air India.
This
criminal negligence in a premier public sector undertaking requires
serious
investigation and the guilty authorities, who are out to destroy the
public
sector, deserve drastic punishment for their shady role in destroying
the
public sector culture. In fact, one finds that the present chairman of
Air India
has been
adopting a hostile attitude towards the employees and the latter are as
a
result a much frustrated lot in the country.

But Pandhe’s letter regretted that instead of taking
stringent
action against the culprits, the employees are being penalised without
any
justification. In these circumstances, the termination of employees’
services,
derecognition of unions or sealing of the union offices can in no way
help in
solving the problem, the letter stressed.

The CITU leader has therefore urged the minister to
take a dispassionate view of the whole question and convene a meeting
of all
the important trade unions with a view to finding a way out of the
present
impasse and restoring the old glory of the Air India and Indian
Airlines. The
letter has expressed the hope that being one of the senior most trade
union
leaders in the country, the minister would realise that the involvement
of
workers and employees is most crucial in reviving the Air India’s
financial
position and market share. Asking the minister to appreciate the
gravity of the
situation, the letter urged him to take urgent steps to restore
normalcy in the
undertaking and take steps to revitalise the premier national carrier
in the
interest of the country.

Repeating his plea for an appointment in order to
discuss the matter with the minister in detail, Pandhe said that an
involvement
of all the employees of Air India,
the public sector undertaking in civil aviation, is what we need to
reach a
break-even point at an early date.

AISGEF
DEMANDS

SETTLEMENT

In
the meantime, through a statement issued on May 1, the All India State
Government Employees’ Federation (AISGEF) has demanded that the Air
India
management and the Ministry of Civil Aviation must take steps to settle the Air India pilots’ strike
immediately.

While
the Air India pilots are on a strike for several days, which has
paralysed the
national carrier, the Civil Aviation Ministry of the government of India
has
unfortunately taken no steps in this direction. Rather, instead of
starting a
dialogue with the association of Air India pilots, the ministry
has
launched vindictive actions against them and several of the pilots have
been
dismissed, their union has been derecognised and the strike has been
declared
illegal.

Issued
by Sukomal Sen, its vice president, the AISGEF statement said in this
regard
that formation of unions and trade union protests constitute a basic
and
fundamental right of the workers under the Indian constitution.

As
it is, the pilots are not a part of the Air India management but are,
under the
labour laws, treated as workmen, irrespective of the amount of salary
and other
perks they enjoy.

It
is understood that the Air India managing director’s harsh and
arbitrary
attitude towards the pilots and other categories of staff is one of the
reasons
of the strike. Moreover, the latest news is that the Air India
authorities are
negotiating with the Kingfisher airlines, owned by a top
industrialist of
the country, and the news goes that the government is preparing to take
on wet
lease the Kingfisher’s aircraft which will fly in the name of Air India.
As the
Kingfisher airlines is in a deep financial crisis, the question is
whether the
Air India authorities are bent upon bailing out this private
enterprise.

Moreover,
taking advantage of the Air India strike, other private airlines have
raised
their fares abnormally and are thus making windfall profits.

In view of the current situation, the All India State
Government Employees’ Federation has urged upon the government to
immediately
talk to the pilots’ association, vacate all victimisations and reach a
negotiated settlement in order to save the national carrier from
further losses.